Internet Service Slow and Intermittently Down

After reading over a dozen similar questions I am of the mind that ATT's Internet service works great for some and is simply a lemon for others. I appear to be falling into the lemon category at the moment after having several months of relatively good connectivity.

Well here the nuts and bolts of it: I have UVerse Elite Internet Package and my speed has never reach the 6mbit level that was advertised. Over the last week things have gotten worse in that the connection keeps dropping entirely at random times. Sometimes in the morning, sometimes the evening. Either way I get numerous logs indicating DNS errors and other problems. I switched my DNS to Google on my computer so that I didn't have to wait for slow servers on ATT's side but that doesn't solve the droputs that are going on.

I would really appreciate it if someone from AT&T could get back to me on this. I am a web developer and require Internet to do my job. After having a falling out with Comcast going back to them is not an option for me. If you guys had another higher tier service I would even pay more to make sure I was able to do my job using it. I heard recently that you guys added fiber to the little town just up the road from me (Gridley, Ca - I'm in the little town of Live Oak, about five miles south of Gridley). Maybe you'll be bringing that to my area soon? It would be really nice to have some faster and more reliable speed.

Please respond to this someone and let me know what I can do to address these issues.

Re: Internet Service Slow and Intermittently Down

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-Mariana

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Re: Internet Service Slow and Intermittently Down

We had similar issues for months, and not only with U-Verse but with the standard DSL before we switched over. Several different techs had been out here and each one found a problem somewhere along the line but the tech that was here yesterday finally figured out the root of the problem.

The first tech discovered bad wiring in the house but missed a wiring issue in the outside box that the second tech later discovered. We now just have our modem placed in the garage and plugged directly into the outside box. Things were better for a few days but got progressively worse so a third tech was dispatched and he ended up finding a corroded connection under the street a few blocks down from us. Again, that fixed things for a day but then it got worse. As he had given me his card I called him back but he flaked on us and I put off calling until this past weekend we barely had internet access at all.

Finally I called att and requested service again and the 4th tech ended up discovering what he referred to as a 'bad port' and was something he had to re-wire at a distant location. It appears this fixed the problem as it's been 24 hours and not a single drop-out. (We use the internet for everything from VOIP to all of our TV viewing and notice drops pretty quick.)

What was deceiving to us and the previous techs is that whenever we called for service or had service done, our connection was good for a day but slowly got worse. This was because when ATT would do a line test and it would reset the bad port and would somehow make it better (just not perfect). This was the clue the last tech used to deduce the bad port issue.

Re: Internet Service Slow and Intermittently Down

Hey Fauntue, just wanted to say thanks for your input, it does sound like a similar issue. Hopefully I don't have to go round and round with a bunch of techs before finding one who actually knows what they're doing! I mean no offense to AT&T but the fact is that often the techs they send know far less than they should about the connection between hardware and software. That's all I can say on the matter without sounding exceedingly nasty!

Re: Internet Service Slow and Intermittently Down

Intermittent issues can be difficult, a process of elimination is the usual method to determine cause.

The premise tech is responsible from the serving terminal to RG...problems with drop wire, NID, inside home wiring and RG would be premise tech, if problem is beyond serving terminal an outside tech from a different department becomes involved. To involve the outside tech requires testing that must fail, if the test(s) are good at time of testing no ticket created.

possible outside issues can include field mice in one of terminals, poor grounding, squirrels chewing wiring, etc. A wind day pulling on loose connection, tech dispatched... calm winds no issue found.

Or in case of split in cable shows on rain or melting snow but dry weather has no problems.

A flaky port (on RG) try different port or replace RG to eliminate possibility but swapping the port in the VRAD is not a first consideration... only so many ports available. ..when one is labeled bad, fewer ports to provide service for those desiring Uverse.

no excuse is meant, but like many professions when multiple issues may result in same symptoms look for most common first, if problem resolved great, if not documented what was done, proceed to next step(s).

Employee Contributor*

*I am an AT&T employee and the postings on this site are my own and don't necessarily represent AT&T's position, strategies or opinions.

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